Page 88 of Waking Olivia

And then he holds one bill longer than the others. The air in the room seems to compress around him while we wait. “What is this?” he asks my mother, holding the bill in front of her face. His quiet voice is bad, far more dangerous than his loud one.

I can smell the fear coming off of her as she answers. “Daisy was having seizures,” she says, her voice too faint, showing weakness. She shouldn’t show weakness, even I know that. My father can smell fear and weakness the way a predator can smell blood, and he reacts the same way.

“I didn’t ask you what the fuck was wrong with the dog. I asked you what the bill’s for.”

“The medicine,” she whispers. “The vet said she needed it or they’d get worse.”

I’m only five but I know she needs to stop talking, stop justifying, stop acting like she’s done something wrong.

He says nothing. He holds still for a moment, and we wait for his hand to fly out, to send her sideways from her chair with a startled cry. But instead, he turns toward Daisy, curled in the corner of the room.

“Let me show you what we do with a sick dog,” he says.

Daisy doesn’t sense danger. She nuzzles into him as he reaches for her. Sometimes, just when I think a terrible thing is going to happen, it doesn’t. And then I feel stupid for fearing it, as if I must have been crazy to expect things to go poorly. He cradles her in his arms and she relaxes, and I relax.

And then my father grabs Daisy’s neck and twists.

She’s still in his arms, her eyes open, unmoving. There is utter silence. I can hear my own pulse, nothing else. And then we begin to cry, a symphony of tears and pain and disbelief. My mother gasping, choking on her tears.

“Oh my God,” is all she can say. “Oh my God oh my God oh my God.”

“You killed her!” my brother weeps.

“Stop crying,” he says to Matthew. “And go dig a hole.”

But Matthew ignores him, his face flat to the table, his whole body loose and boneless with grief. My father pulls his collar so his face comes off the table.

“I said stop your goddamn crying and go dig a hole!” he yells.

I stop crying so fast that I choke a little. I stop as if it will make up for the fact that Matthew cannot. Matthew’s always been soft in ways I’m not, and it’s the only thing about me that’s ever made my father happy.

Stop crying, Matthew. You’ve got to stop. Look at me, I plead silently.You can stop just like I do. Look at me.

Even my mother has come to her senses. She grabs Matthew’s hand and through her own tears urges him to calm down, to go on outside like my dad said. But he doesn’t. He can’t. His tears are a form of insanity, suicide, and he just can’t stop.

I jump up so fast my chair falls behind me. “I’ll do it!” I cry. “I’ll do it!” My voice is hysterical with enthusiasm. “I can dig the hole!”

My father nods. “That’s my girl. Glad someone in this family takes after me.”

My brother looks at me. I see blame in his face, hatred. I did it for him, but suddenly I’m a monster now, just like my dad.

61

Will

Her screams wakeeveryone in the house.

I’m there first and seconds behind me my mother and Brendan arrive, huddled at the door, staring at us in shock.

“I dug the hole,” she says, scraping at her throat as if she can’t breathe. She gasps for air once and then again. “I dug the hole.”

She’s curled up in a ball, knees squeezed tight to her chest. I try to pull her toward me but her whole body has gone so stiff that nothing moves. “It’s okay, Liv. You’re just having a dream. It’s okay.”

“No,” she says, choking again, grabbing her own throat. “It wasn’t a dream. It was me.Idid it. I dug the hole.”

“Dug what hole?” I ask, trying to pry her arms apart.

“Where he buried Matthew,” she says. “I dug the hole.”

---